Help talk:Adding texts

Search methods
The best way to confirm if a text exists is by looking up the author and checking against the list of Works there. Searching for the name often fails because texts are called by different names especiily translated works. The other best option is searching through Google with a few lines ifrom the text in quotes.--BirgitteSB 17:59, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
 * I've changed the search instructions to use Google, with a convenient link directly to the Google search with the site-specific syntax filled in. Is this better? // Pathoschild (editor / talk ) 19:51, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
 * This looks really great. Good work!--BirgitteSB 23:31, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Create New Work
I'm moving this above the 'advanced options' section since it is pretty buried. This will be my first contrib and to be honest after searching the text in vain for a quick way to start a work, I almost decided it wasn't worth it. Antonrojo 02:21, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

So, I can just copy from Gutenberg and just put the files here? Wuld that be violating any laws or anything? TsunamiEssence 19:50, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Over 99% of Gutenberg's works are public domain, which means they have no control over telling you what you can and can't do with the work that they are providing. So, yes, you basically can just add any text from Gutenberg here without breaking any laws.—Zhaladshar (Talk) 20:17, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Page Spammed
The contents were replaced with an advertising. I've reverted the page to its previous edit. I hope I've done this right! --Aateyya 02:30, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes, you reverted correctly. Thanks for noticing it. :) // [ admin ] Pathoschild (talk/map) 03:36, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Public Domain Works Reprinted in Anthologies?
Is it allowable to either transcribe, or scan and digitise, a public domain text which is reprinted in an anthology which is still under copyright, if the original language of the work is English, (thus no issues regarding copyrighted translation)? - a hypothetical example would be a poem by Edgar Allan Poe (died > 100 years ago, so his works are public domain), reprinted in an anthology published in, let's say 1990. If this is acceptable, would we list the anthology as the source on the discussion page associated with the text? Thanks, Lini 20:51, 1 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The copyright status would depend on whether the text was changed. If the text is identical to the original, it is in the public domain. If they edited it (for example, with annotations, comments, creative formatting, improvements, or corrections) they might own the copyright on that edition. — {admin} Pathoschild 23:16:00, 01 June 2007 (UTC)

Articles linking to uploaded PDF files
I want to add all the PDFs from a federal government report but except for the PDF mentioned as a help file, I see nothing about whether it is OK to actually upload and link to them from a main page. I do see when you go to upload doing so is mentioned. So I think a brief mention that this can be done should be in this article. I'll report back if I have any problems putting that together! Carolmooredc (talk) 22:47, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Notability
Does wikisource have the same or similar notability requirements as wikipedia?
 * See What Wikisource includes. There's no "notability" requirement per se, but the source should be verifiable. —Spangineerwp (háblame) 20:47, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

New Work
I have two historical books (published in 1881 and 1886), with very interesting text (English and Spanish) and pictures on archaeological trips made in Central America, that I would like to upload. Some of the text is already uploaded. [(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ometepe_(archaeological_site) and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zapatera_(archaeological_site)], being my first contribution I am sure will have difficulties. Wonder if someone out there can guide and help in the process.

--Gumr51 (talk) 15:05, 6 October 2010 (UTC)
 * see reply at Wikisource_talk:What_is_Wikisource%3F cygnis insignis 15:16, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Multilanguage texts
The current help page provides guidance on works that are either in English or in some other language, advising users to use one of the other wikisource language sites for non-English works. The page provides no guidance for users seeking transcription of multi-language works (e.g. works where there is a sourcetext in one language and a translation in another). This is a case of works that do not "fit in the box" in the organization of wikisource by specific languages. Aharonium (talk) 08:10, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Creating a User page
I've been editing Wikipedia for years, also as thnidu, but I'm new here. When I clicked on my (then-red) user page link, the instructions included
 * Please read Help:Adding texts and our inclusion guidelines, then add User:thnidu to Wikisource.

But AFAICT, nothing on the help page has any bearing on user pages, and the inclusion guidelines don't apply at all because nothing is being "included": a user page is exactly, and maybe the only, place where entirely original material is appropriate. Instead, that instruction text ought to offer some guidance about setting up a user page, or be simply removed. --Thnidu (talk) 11:57, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

New language version of existing book
I have an English version of a youth guide that is already available in Viquillibres and Wikilibros. This has been writen by the Catalan Youth Agency (who has no entry) and translated by a professional translator. Do I still need to do the scan and correction step? I am new and I have no clue of how to continue. --Btauri (talk) 07:52, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

I would like to get some pointers also,i'm also new here. Olwethu Mtwisha (talk) 08:57, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

A question
I would like to add the flowing text to Wikisource: Could you please check if I understood the steps properly? I upload the pdf file to wikimedia commons, create a wikimedia page(and add a link to the scan) type in it the table of contents, create a page for every chapter and start copying the text. Correct me if I’m mistaken. And btw, the text is public domain because it’s a government document. Thanks in advance, RiverThames27 (talk) 10:14, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * In rough terms, yes. The general process is to upload the scan to Commons, and then create a page with the same name as the file in the Index: namespace here (so for  you would create  ). The Index: page contains metadata like title and author, but most critically it contains a pagelist that maps the logical pages (what is printed on each page in the original) to the physical pages (the actual page order in the PDF). Since the particular scan in this case doesn't use page numbers the two will be the same and won't much matter, but for your typical published book they will be quite different.Once you have the Index: in place, the Mediawiki software will create links to wikipages in the Page: namespace (they'll be of the pattern   for page 123 of the PDF file). In these wikipages the scanned page from the PDF will be displayed side by side with an editing text field where you can transcribe the text of that page. If the PDF file contains a hidden text layer with OCR text, that text will be pre-filled in the text field.The final step is to use "transclusion" to join the text from each page together and present them to readers in a page like The Constitution of Rhodesia. If the work uses chapters or other such divisions, it can be split into subpages like The Constitution of Rhodesia/Chapter 1.One tip though: this particular PDF uses double-page spreads for each scan image. This is somewhat awkward to handle (the software is designed to have a single page on each page of the scan) so you may want to investigate splitting it up and make a new PDF before uploading (it's a real pain to do after you start proofreading it). For help with this, or other questions, I would recommend asking on Scriptorium/Help (this page is not watched by a lot of people, so you'll have a better response there). --Xover (talk) 15:37, 30 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the reply! I still don’t understand how you link the file in Wikisource since the sources I checked didn’t link. I left a question in ws:s/h. Thank you very much! RiverThames27 (talk) 11:46, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Upload new book in Public Domain from IA
What if a book became Public Domain in USA due to original publication date was >95 years ago, but Internet Archive contains only publications from years <95 years ago. Can it still be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons for Text adding and Proofreading ? Coalesce (talk) 19:15, 20 February 2021 (UTC)